The ability to multi-task or do many things at the same time is required in many human endeavors. Food preparation is one such example. With the preparation of a meal, multi-tasking often involves cooking various foods that make up a main course such as meat, vegetables and rice, and also preparing a salad, beverage and dessert during approximately the same time period. Timing all of this preparation is often difficult. For professional cooks, multi-tasking in meal preparation is often more important and difficult as many meals have to be prepared at the same time. For regular and professional cooks, the need to manage the various tasks associated with preparing a meal is also further complicated because the cooking completion time of food is often not accurately known.
In this regard, although many recipes provide an approximate time when a given food will be ready or cooked, these times can often be inaccurate. For example, with meat, the suggested cooking time typically depends on the size of the meat and the temperature of the cooking surface or oven. If the cut of meat or temperature of the oven vary from the average or expected, the suggested cooking time will not be accurate. Thus, the suggested cooking time may need to be adjusted based on experience and by past problems when the food is either undercooked or overcooked. Given variations in cooking time, the cook is typically required to attend to the food being cooked by constantly monitoring its state of readiness. For example, the cook usually monitors the cooking state by the use of a meat thermometer which requires that the cooking process be interrupted and monitored or by inserting a knife or fork into the meat or by noting whether the color of the meat is desirable. Alternatively, the cook may set a timer depending on the suggested cooking time. In either case, the cook's time is used inefficiently as the suggested cooking time is often inaccurate.
Therefore, in view of the above problems with cooking time, there is a need for new methods, apparatus and systems that allow a person cooking food to know with an improved level of accuracy the cooking completion time of food that is being cooked.